First Day in New Zealand

The journey from LA to Auckland is all a bit of a blur because, to be honest, we were so incredibly comfortable (for a change) on the trip over to New Zealand.
    As far as Charlotte is concerned, we showed the lady our boarding passes, had dinner and threw our jammys on - the next thing we know, we're sitting in Auckland Airport asking for a funny looking (NZ) dollar coin to ride the Buzzy Bee!

Aunty Lucy had just finished a night-shift, so was home sleeping when we arrived; but lucky for us, Uncle Regan and Amelia were there to pick us up and buy us all a long-awaited Flat White. 

   After collecting our baggage, the next job on the list was to turn our Canadian iPhones into unwitting slaves of the appallingly slow Tele-scum 3G network. 

    Sipping our coffees, we punched out a series of test messages to let people know we'd arrived. In response, we received this photo from Niccy-Niccy in Dunedin, promising good weather and good times with family when we travel south in six days time...

Rainbow over Purakaunui Inlet

After almost 48 hours floating in the atmosphere, we put all the travelling behind us and headed west to RNZAF Base Whenuapai, to start our NZ Vacation.

We were all totally beat, so after a lazy afternoon playing with Amelia for a while on the mat, we eventually made ourselves some Milo (hot chocolate), threw our jammas back on. It was around this time we joined Aunty Lucy for a snooze...

I admit being back on the Air Force Base again was a little strange for me after so many years away. Specially after meeting the first Commissioned-Officer that I didn't have to salute.

    I looked around marvelling at how much had changed (and also the many things that had obviously stayed the same), while Michelle and Charlotte seemed more interested in the funny looking birds, the great New Zealand weather and the funny clouds moving across the sky, (not to mention the C-130 Hercules doing circuits and passing overhead every six minutes). 

    Truth be told, the biggest draw card for all of us was Tig's beautiful little cousin, Amelia - who seemed to light up like a firecracker every time Charlotte walked in the room.

Stashing my passport away in my bag for the last time in three days, I sighed. I realized I was the local boy again, and it was Michelle and Charlotte's turn to be the immigrants.

    After enduring the longest, coldest Canadian winter in almost 30 years, it took a little bit of explaining to convince Charlotte that it was OK to sleep with the curtains closed and the windows open.

    Tired as we were, we were all pretty excited to be home, and it took a little while to settle down for the first proper rest in days. I was looking forward to showing Michelle and Charlotte around their 'home-away-from-home', and could tell the girls were looking forward to connecting with their extended New Zealand family. I think this holiday was going to be fun.

LAX - Auckland: New Zealand, Here We Come!

After a relaxing day in the Californian sun and a much-needed sleep in our "new house", we took one last shower at the hotel, packed up our bags and headed down to LAX to catch our fourteen hour flight to New Zealand.
    We checked our bags, shopped for a bit, and sat down for a bite to eat at the terminal. At the gate, we had a short discussion about how Dad's Passport was a different colour than Mum and Charlotte's (clearly, the one with the "'Nadian Flag" was for the girls, and the other one is for boys): then we showed "the girl" our boarding passes.
    I'm used to boarding last when travelling by air, but luckily for us, having Charlotte with us meant we got to board first; following the wheel chairs and before the "Platinum, Executive Gold, Gold, and VIP members"...
    The anticipation peaked as we turned down the air-stair and found our chariot emblazoned with the Air New Zealand paint scheme and a Lord of the Rings theme.

Was is a comfortably trip? I think the picture speaks for itself...

Michelle and Charlotte curled up in the newly-converted double bed and Charlotte slept ten hours straight, and I snaffled up the empty row in front, sprawled out like a star fish...

    

Roll-on Season 3 of Game of Thrones and Bravo Air New Zealand Economy Skycouch.

Day Off at Manhattan Beach

After five years of flying back and forth between Halifax and New Zealand, we've learned it's always wise to have a planned day off in the middle of all the laborious air travel. For the longest time, I have sat in LAX for hours on end, waiting for connecting flights of one form or another, completely unaware of the fact that five minutes down the road, is the wonderful Manhattan Beach.
    We had arrived in Los Angeles at 10:50 pm local time (2:50am AST) the night before so allowed ourselves a generous sleep-in in the Four Points Sheraton (or, "Our New House" as Charlotte puts it). We wandered about the hotel lobby for a bit, looking at all the options on the tourist board.
    There was plenty of cool stuff to do, but our 'holiday budget' dictated we use the 'affordable option',  and decided a bus ride to the beach was the best idea after all.
    By taking so long to mull over our options, we ended up missing the first bus out to the beach, but that gave us time to head across the road to the Starbucks in one of the neighbouring hotels. (We were served by a Maori guy from Taranaki - in Los Angeles - typical!).
    After an hour waiting in the beautiful West Coast sun, the bus arrived and took us to Manhattan Beach. Once there, we got our priorities straight and went for a champaign breakfast.

Mimosa's at Manhattan

Eggs benedict, waffles, french toast, grilled cheese, champaign & orange juice; the Jet Stars hit the shoreline. We headed down to the pier to check out the aquarium, pelicans, fishermen, volleyball players, roller bladers, surfers, paddle boarders, and other beautifully tanned Californian locals, ignoring white and pasty tourists like us.

After a very late night and more than two hours sitting patiently in the Cafe, followed by walking around the white sandy beaches in her sneakers, rather than on them in her bare feet, Charlotte eventually ran out of patience with her parents and insisted on heading down to the 'sandy part'. So, off we went... 

The pictures speak for themselves.

Glorious as it was to finally have our bare skin out in the atmosphere (following one of the longest, coldest Canadian winters in more than thirty years), the time came to return to the hotel for Charlotte (and Dad) to take a quick nap prior to heading to the airport at 7pm that evening.

    We grabbed the kid (who by this stage, was down to her tighty whities), rinsed her under the tap to relieve her of a ton of sand (which caused her to squawk a bit), then headed up the hill to the bus stop to catch a ride back to our 'New House'.

It was only a fifteen minute trip via the Manhattan Beach outlet stores, but one of us didn't manage to survive the trip.

I guess it's hard work jet-setting until 2am, then sun bathing all day at the beach. Next stop... LAX to catch our flight back to the land of the Long Flat White: Auckland, New Zealand.